Kegaku's remaining hand tapped five times against the pressure-bed rail.
The funeral engine gave him plenty of rhythms, from wheels striking rail joints beneath his spine to pump valves knocking behind the sixth car. One loose roof pipe clicked whenever the locomotive leaned east. He had spent the last hour separating those sounds from his own heart.
This tapping climbed through his fingers from the iron.
His thumb landed first, followed by the third finger, the smallest, and two more in a pattern his hand knew better than his head. The sixth tap hurt inside the arm Kieran had cut away.
Kegaku trapped his living fingers beneath the bed strap. The phantom ones kept playing.
Across the gap between cars, Kieran lifted her head from the tank. The repaired flute case remained hooked under one elbow.
"That is the exact fingering you used before my arm turned against Jade on Earth."
"I remember what it did, but I cannot remember learning it."
